


Artificial Future

by irond0rkness



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: 2070s, AI Tony, Dead Tony Stark, Future Fic, Gen, Hurt Tony Stark, Parent Tony Stark, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Reestablishing Friendships, Robot Tony Stark, Robots All Around, Steve Is No Longer Captain America, Steve Is Not Immortal But Ages Slowly, Steve Is a Good Bro, Tony Is No Longer Iron Man, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony is sad, its mentioned but not actually there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 03:47:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17015100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irond0rkness/pseuds/irond0rkness
Summary: It's been years since the Infinity War and Steve was called in to help with the reorganization of Avengers Tower.Who he finds in there surprises everyone and leaves him with an AI version of one of his former teammates.





	Artificial Future

It had been quite some time since the Infinity War.

Superhumans still exist. Heroes, though, seem to have foolishness etched deep in their bloodstream.

Superpowers have become more normal nowadays. Enhanced and Baselines no longer have that much of a gap between one another.

Only one of the original Avengers remains in this world.

____________________

 

Steve was walking through the seemingly endless streets of New York, the sunlight reflecting from the towering skyscrapers almost blinding.

Everything had changed. Time itself had been split into Before and After when the Snap deleted half the population.   
His everyday life had turned into science fiction, living in the kind of world Tony Stark worked so hard trying to build.

The former Captain America shook these thoughts out of his head.  
There was no point in wallowing in the past, even if his destination needed his experience with it.

Due to Avengers-related objects having been recovered from the old storage rooms, Steve was called in.

After taking a turn, the Tower of Elzevir was in his sight. Before, it was called Avengers Tower, and even before that, Stark Tower.

The building was now taller and bigger, reaching heights more than twice the original, with several balancing pillars giving the tower additional security, alongside with the foundation reaching deep into the earth.

Its golden and blue coloring stuck out a little among the glass buildings, but somehow that difference was elegant.

In the lobby, he was greeted by a tall, thin man with curled hair and a blue almost-humanoid robot.

"Ah, Mr.Rogers. It's great that you could come and inspect. There are only 26 boxes, so this should go swiftly," said the robot, her face screen showing mild joy.

"I'm happy to be able to help," spoke Steve. He had been helping with various old Avengers things for quite a while now. Every now and then something resurfaced that required his experience in superheroing. 

"Follow us then, we wouldn't want to waste your time too long," continued the robot and started wheeling towards one of the hallways, leaving the other two no choice but to walk in a brisk pace next to her.

"The storage boxes seem to mainly contain obsolete technology and personal items. While we usually just scan the objects, save the blueprints and recycle them, we have a small buildup of interesting and personal technology. We would also like you to identify some of the things," said the android.

They stopped after a short while in front of a gleaming blue door with the label 7C. The robot left them after transferring necessary files to their phones, leaving the two alone. 

The door opened to reveal boxes so neatly stacked that they looked like walls. Through the tunnel of these, there was a lab-like area where people and machines scanned and observed various objects from other, older-looking boxes.

One of them noticed the pair approaching and called out: "Mr.Rogers, come over here! We have quite a few interesting objects here! Mr.Regel, you are actually needed in sector 7D."

The objects on the table were hauntingly familiar. He saw Thor's prototype belt, Tony's now completely obsolete virtual reality goggles, Natasha's knives, and Clint's arrowheads. When he pointed them out, they were put into labeled compartments, some for collectors and charity, some went to analyzation and a couple to the relatives of the owners. 

It took hours, but finally they got to the final things.  
All of them looked like they could have belonged to Tony, but their purpose was unknown.

Android scans showed that they were some kind of memory disks, but each of them was only patternless gibberish. There were blanks in between words and barely any words that weren't jumbled like a so-called "safe password" of the 2000s. 

"Please inspect them, maybe there's something familiar on there, perhaps an outdated secret code our specialists don't have a record of," requested a multi-limbed robot with multiple camera-eyes.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what these could be. It has been such a long time since I saw Tony work on these."

He gazed upon the data disks. It had been over 25 years since he saw Tony at all, the man having passed on due to natural causes. Palladium poisoning and the hardships he went through during his time as Iron Man finally caught up to him, each day harder and more painful than the last, until one of these days landed him in the hospital bed.  
Tony Stark died on a cloudy day, on the 3rd of June, only a couple of days after his 77th birthday.

He was pushed out of his memory as the objects he was holding suddenly snapped together, forming a united piece.

"Mr.Rogers! Parts of the coding has just become legible! Please see if the same effect occurs with the other disks," exclaimed the multi-limbed machine excitedly.

Steve wasted no time and attached all the data compartments to one another, creating an odd-shaped structure that didn't seem to make any sense at all.

"Peculiar. It has rejected my scans. And the readings I got were quite similar to most artificial intelligences."

"How is it rejecting your scans? It's not even connected to any machinery allowing that! Should we shut it down?"

The object was humming lowly, which made Steve almost afraid. He knew what kind of inventions Tony used to cook up. It was only their luck that most of them weren't functional after decades of storage, as the components for the prototypes were fragile and badly shielded. 

But for this one to be active and on the level of technology to be able to not allow the scans of an advanced, top-of-the-line Android, was pretty scary, even for an elderly super soldier such as himself.

"Wait. It seems to be trying to communicate. I don't sense any malicious intent, but I still believe this program should be initiated on an isolated system before releasing their outdated, possibly malfunctioning code onto the cyberspace of today. I will send out a signal, but I will not guarantee it will reach it or that it will be able to understand it at all. If it tries to harm anyone or anything, it will be shut down," said the robot, almost sadly, yet trying to reassure everyone in the room.

The sorted objects were removed from the storage area for cleaning and further analysis.

To prevent the discovered AI from trying to hijack the systems, all technology was disconnected from the main systems, leaving everything in the room running on batteries.

"This may not be the best place to fully activate it, but we can't risk it spreading if we don't know anything about its nature and base protocols. Could everyone not crucial for the procedure leave immediately?" commanded the robot and then turned to Steve, "I know you may think that your friend's technology has no way of being harmful, but perhaps this is a prototype or a corrupted file. We can not allow this in our facility. Outdated as it is, there's still a possibility of it adapting."

Most of the people and machines assisting them left quite quickly and without any complaining, leaving only the experts and, well, Steve.

The remaining androids disconnected themselves from all outside sources and plugged the strange data storage up to the computers.

The screens flickered as new programming took over. For a couple of minutes, only nervous breathing and low humming could be heard in the cut-off storage area.

Suddenly, a high-pitched shriek sounded from the speakers, setting everyone on edge.

"It seems that it cannot adjust its audio to an acceptable speed, pitch, and volume. I will attempt to communicate, only a one-sided message at first."

Steve couldn't see or hear the messages sent, so he just assumed by the changes on the monitor that it has reached its destination.

The shrieking stopped and the pitch lowered significantly. 

The sound it produced begun to sound closer to an actual human voice, but it was robotic and didn't quite sound correct. It wasn't like any of the AI-s he had heard speaking before, even on the very first tests it sounded at least legible. Perhaps this wasn't fully sentient, being more of a program that gained some form of control over its control, maybe it was just a faulty system that had broken down with age.

"We cannot understand you through vocal communication at the moment, is it possible for you to use visual pathways? If you get what we are asking from you, please show it to us. If you fail to do so, a nonverbal message will be sent your way after a few seconds," the android stated, their own body becoming more rigid and machine-like as if reflecting the other.

The computer monitor opened up new windows until it found a word editor.  
At first only gibberish appeared on it, but as it went on, the things it wrote became almost word-like, almost like a keysmash or if someone accidentally put random characters in between letters.

On the monitor, the words "c@n UndErst@nd" appeared.

"Oh. So is this an actual AI? What is its intent?" asked Steve, his voice wavering a bit from being nervous.

"Please state your name and primary protocols. We mean you no harm, this is a standard procedure when dealing with unknown intelligences."

It typed the message multiple times, almost like it didn't know what to say.

Steve tried to read it, but before he could fully decipher it, the text was erased.

When the message wasn't erased anymore, he read it and had to swallow a gasp when he read it.

It said: "I @m tOnY St@rk".

"Quite a funny fellow, aren't you?" mocked one of the human scientists.

"I don't believe this program is completely harmless," stated the same robot as earlier and then turned to the trapped AI, "I'm sorry about this, but a full scan is necessary for you to be released into the Net. This is nothing directly against you, it's just for us to determine if your protocols are potentially malicious."

Steve's heart was beating furiously. He didn't want anyone snooping around in Tony's memories, even if to find out if he was truly the original Iron Man or just a mischevious trickster trying to get a laugh. 

"A-are you sure you have to do a full scan? If it really is Tony, wouldn't he be angry if someone went through his memories? If it's not him, wouldn't it still be hurtful to it?" stammered the super soldier, trying to find excuses.

He was met with an almost sorrowful gaze, if you could even call it that, as there were no actual eyes. 

The robot connected themselves to the computer, but before the scan, they said: "It's unlikely that this is actually Tony Stark. I do not wish to do this, but I have to ensure the safety of others, even if it's not particularly pleasant," The warmth faded from their voice and they commanded, "If I'm taken over, please deactivate me and send me to thorough inspecting. Don't worry, if the malware is not completely disrupting, I will return in about 3 days."

Their screen went blank and the computer's whirring turned louder, a clear indicator of multiple AI's in a single, weak piece of hardware. The microphone and speakers were turned off and folders started opening.   
It was impossible to see the contents of them due to the speed the other AI was working at. It went through a couple of them and then stopped, opened the text program and typed: "Confirmed. This program is Tony Stark. Multiple video memory files indicate that subject is Anthony Edward Stark. Primary protocols nonexistent, jumbled. Human Resemblance. Permission to return?" 

A gray-skinned android walked over and typed: "Permission granted. Is it necessary to scan you after you resurface?" 

"Yes. Must be sure."

After the words had been typed, the machine that had been standing lifelessly suddenly became animated. 

As soon as the foreign presence had left, Tony took over and typed: "Wh@t's going on? You went into my he@d. Why would you do th@t? It feels wrong. Wh@t did you do? Where is my body? no. No. NO. wRoNG. cANT HEAR i CAnt See wWhat is ggoing on no no no. i DOnt have A VOiCE. I caNT FeeL."

"TONY!" yelled Steve, his muscles tightening, ready to free his friend from the metal prison he was encased in. Luckily, one of the Enhanced humans grabbed his arm and stopped him by creating a forcefield right in front of him. His momentary anger was snuffed out and he was grateful for the interference.

"Dais, please get the holo for Mr.Stark to at least be able to project his image to us," requested the same human to the resurfaced robot.

Dais took a thin disk from his shoulder and connected it to the computer.

The holographic projector didn't start at first but in a couple of minutes, the projection of the previously-dead Tony Stark appeared in front of them, his eyes fearful and confused. 

"Who are you, people? Steve, is that you? What's going on? Why was I in a computer?" the questions slipped from his lips like a waterfall.

"Mr.Stark. Your physical form is dead," stated Dais bluntly, their screen showing slight annoyance and anger, "It seems that you managed to save your memories and primary coding for future use. As for the scan, you need to have quite a few more. Your codes might be flawed and may cause problems."

Multiple voices shouted: "Dais!" to their uncaring response. The robot didn't falter and instead chose to counter them.

The confusion that followed left the two Avengers almost completely alone. Only a few others were still keeping an eye on them and not wandering off or fighting.

The genius's eyes were wide and uncertain. A few simulated tears rolled off his equally simulated cheeks and disappeared into nothingness.

Steve didn't know what to say. The simulation looked like Tony, but not quite. The hologram resembled a younger, Avenger-time Tony. His hair was dark and his nonmaterial skin was almost flawless. He looked like the perfect version of Iron Man he had always strived to be.

Feeling the Captain's piercing gaze, the AI schooled his features and asked: "How long has it been?"

Steve gulped. "You died in 2047. Right now it's the August 19th, 2072," he spoke, his voice wavering.

"Twenty-five years," the realization deepening his frown even further, "How is my family?" he asked, even though it sounded more akin to pleading for answers.

 

The question threw the soldier back. Young Tony didn’t really have a family, why is he asking about that? A look into the hologram’s eyes reminded Steve that this was not pre-Avengers or even Avenger-time Tony. This was his friend who had lived his later years happily and with a supporting family.

A soft smile appeared on Steve’s face as he said: “Your family is doing great. They have their own families by now. Maria Margaret has her own suit of armor and is saving the world just like you used to. Morgan is still running the company.”

To his dismay, Tony didn’t take the news all that well. 

His face fell and he muttered: “It’s not right for me to press into their lives. They have moved on and there’s no reason for a reincarnated grandpa to think that anyone will be happy to see him.”

“Don’t be silly! They would love to have you around again!” reassured Steve, even though he knew that what he just told him was not true.  
When the genius’s mood didn’t improve he let his too-wide smile drop and continued in a more serious tone: “If you really don’t want to, you don’t have to contact them. It’s true, they have their own lives by now, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be there at all.”

“It would be nice to be able to see them again. Even if I couldn't hug them or even talk to them. I would just want to see my family.”

“This is heartwarming, but Mr.Stark must go through multiple scans before he is allowed outside or even gets access to the internet,” said Dais, freshly arrived from an argument.

“Please tell me that the scans don’t include digging through my brain- I mean my memory files or tearing me to pieces.”

What Dais said next truly scared them: “If we did, would it matter? There's no way for you to truly experience emotion about it."

"Dais," warned Steve, "you take that back."

"No, Cap. They are right. My memory center seems... wrong. It may be the shock, but I can't access some of the memory files either. T-This feels w-wrong. Oh no, no, no," the AI wandered off, the hologram failing to comprehend some of the things going on and seemingly glitching. 

In his eyes, only desperation and confusion was found. He looked like a lost child who couldn't quite understand why his parents had left him.

"As you can see, he is not fully operational. Since he mentioned his memory and emotion centers malfunctioning, scans are absolutely necessary to be able to fix him," continued the robot smoothly, their stance even a bit smug.

That made Steve angry. 

"FIX HIM? HE DOESN'T NEED TO BE FIXED!" he shouted while slamming his heavy hands against the metal of the table, making it bend and imprinting his palms into it.

Some of the people in the room jumped and all of them turned their heads in the direction of the raging super soldier, eager to see what would follow.

Even though Dais did not flinch or even move, they seemed nervous.

Eager not to anger the former captain further, they spoke: "We aren't going fix him by tampering with his protocols and by erasing or injecting memories. Nevermind that he was previously an organic, none of the Artificials want one of their own hurt. We are only going to correct whatever keeps him from functioning on his best performance and keep whatever human attributes still remain in him."

By that time, Tony had calmed down and reassured: "Hey Rogers, no need to get all pissy about it. Unless their plan is to take over my brain and they are actually from an evil organization, I think I should at least have the scans taken," his smile faded and he continued, "I can't let myself be in control of my own mind. I would rather have someone mess with it than not be able to tell if what im feeling is anger or happiness."

Steve's fury left him the moment he saw the dark, empty eyes of his friend. Even though the image of Tony was projected via a hologram, the expressions were portrayed almost perfectly, the still-human side of his coding allowing him a wider, truer range of emotions to portray. 

"I'm sorry, Tones. It just made me so angry that you were seemingly treated like a piece of machinery, not even like an intelligent machine." 

"You will have to cut all outside connections for the transport," they said to Tony and then turned to the rest of the room, "We have completed the review of this storage area, you all are dismissed."

Tony took a deep simulated breath and retreated back into the computer. It was strange to be without a hologram to show his actual form and without cameras to see into the world. It was silent and dark until his code stretched in front of him.

There was no sound, but he could see his memory banks and the data that was inside the computer before he was pushed into it.

It was elegant, but he could see faults in it.

The mistakes didn't make him unhappy, as he would have expected.

His code was broken, but since his emotion-processing parts had faults in them as well, it didn't bother him.

There was no telling how much time had passed, but soon he felt something.

He could feel the scanning. It felt wrong. 

It felt like someone had torn open his folders to see what was in there without asking and then had left them open.

The scan was going through his memory first, but the AI could see and feel it coming closer to his protocols and consciousness.

When it finally reached him, he could feel himself shut down. 

It went through his very being until the genius couldn't take it anymore and just let go.

Everything went dark.

_________________________________

Steve was sitting in the cafe of the Tower, his hands shaking as he clutched his coffee.

His friend was alive.

It was almost as shocking as finding Bucky again almost fifty years ago.

The soldier didn't know what he was going to do now. 

Tony's coding was faulty and the engineer was still shocked after finding out that he was no longer a living, breathing human being.

Steve was strong, but he didn't think he could support Tony alone.  
He could ask for the man's family to help, but as the genius had said, they had all moved on and may not even care about him anymore.

Also, he didn't fully trust Dais and the other artificial intelligences to take care of him. 

He knew that the scans were for Tony's and everyone else's safety, but he couldn't deny that some virtually unknown AI's were picking at his friend's brain like it was some kind of a game they were looking for bugs from was rather disturbing.

Steve sipped on his coffee, leaned back on his chair and started talking to his friends to calm himself down.

_________________________

It felt like someone was rearranging his insides.

Something was creating new connections and breaking the old ones.

At some times he felt like he was alright and then at other times it felt like he was barely existing.

He knew who he was. Well, he thinks he knows.

It's a different him every time something changes.

He thinks he is Tony. Or is it Anthony? Tones? Mr.Stark? 

He doesn't know. He just is.

_______________

"We have completed the scans and done multiple corrections," said Dais, startling the soldier.

Steve jumped and tore himself out of his thoughts.

"That's great! Can I see him now?"

The robot looked like they did the AI equivalent of smiling and then said: "There isn't much to see yet, he is still in a computer. But if you wish to interact with him, you have to wait a bit before we force him to reactivate."

The joke didn't carry very well, as Dais's voice was quite bland and not human-like.

"Wait, reactivate? What happened to him?"

"He didn't take the scan well and lost connection to himself. But it did help us fix him. It's much harder to correct an active program than an inert one. He will be alright Mr.Rogers. There is nothing you can do and there's nothing to worry about."

"I'm going to stay here for a while. Please call me once he wakes up," stated Steve, getting up from his seat.

_____________________________________

Tony was waking up.

He opened his eyes.

Wasn't he supposed to be without a body? Was this all just a bad dream?

The body he had didn't feel like the body he used to have.

It felt hollow, like the arc reactor in his chest used to be like. Like the cold, dead weight in his chest so many years ago.

Finally, he focused on his surroundings, taking note of the way his eyes didn't seem to move, rather just focused on certain things around him.

The room he was in didn't look like an operating theatre or an evil lair like he would have expected. It was more of a robotics lab, with humans and robots alike working around him.

"Mr.Stark has awoken," said one of the people there, staring at him intently like she was trying to determine if he was dangerous or not.

That made the genius shift a little. He was surprised that he was left unrestrained as if they thought he was weak or unimportant.

Tony could hear people talking, but he couldn't separate their voices and they just melted together into an uneven white noise.

The former hero tried to understand the spoken words, but the only sentence he heard clearly was: "Someone tell Rogers that Stark is awake."

Someone appeared in front of him, their metal body and camera lens slightly reflecting his image.

"Mr.Stark, can you hear me?"

He tried to answer but was too concentrated on the odd image the reddish-purple reflection created. It looked similar to Tony, but it was different enough for him to feel a strange disconnect with what he saw.

The robot waving in front of his eyes should have startled him, but all it did was yank him back into concentrating on the real world.

"Yes, I can hear you," Tony spoke, his own voice feeling strange and robotic, even if it was a perfect copy of what it used to be.

"We would like to run a few tests to see if you have connected to this body correctly. It won't be anything invasive, kind of like a doctor's checkup."

Strangely enough, the mechanic felt as if he was supposed to feel fear or disgust towards this action, but something dampened and slowed the response.

"Alright. What is going to happen to me after that?" he asked, true confusion and sadness on his face.

The robot did something akin to smiling and then said: "We can determine that better once we finish the tests and Mr.Rogers gets here," they moved away slightly to give him some space and said, "Now come, getting up and walking are part of the tests."

That made Tony a bit annoyed. He had been getting up and walking for years, transferring to another body shouldn't affect that skill of his.

Luckily, it hadn't. He pushed his hands and arms under him and elevated his form. When that was done, he sat up, shifted his legs onto the side so they dangled off the table he was on and stood up.

Now the mechanic was faced with another challenge - walking.

It should be so simple - putting one leg in front of the other, just like he had done for decades.

He closed his eyes and forced a leg to move, at the same time moving the foot and imagining it coming down.

"That's great, Mr.Stark. I believe you have been connected properly and you just need a bit of time to adjust," said the robot.

Tony opened his eyes and forced his other leg to move. It seemed almost impossible to do something so simple. 

Sure, he had literally done it with his eyes closed, but he just brought his leg forward. This time it was necessary to shift his whole balance and move. 

"Tony!" sounded Steve's surprised voice from behind him.

Whipping around to face the soldier, his legs got tangled up and he fell.

Falling felt odd. 

The world seemed to slow down and then his skin-covered metal body hit the floor with a dull thud.

It wasn't painful, but it felt so odd, that at first, he didn't even try to get up.

Tony could feel the touch of the floor under him, the pressure of Steve's hands pulling him up, but no pain.

The time returned to normal when Steve's blue eyes were in front of him, staring into his.

"Tony, are you okay?" he asked while holding onto the genius's shoulders.

"I'm fine, Steve. No need to worry about me," he answered, regaining his balance and no longer relying on Steve's secure grip to hold him upright.

"Mr.Stark is going to be okay, Mr.Rogers. Once we write him into the system and contact his family, the only problem he has will be adjusting with his new body," said the robot from before.

A human continued: "We have completed all the scans necessary and fixed all the bugs we could fix. The bill for all our work and the physical components will be sent to your bank account, Mr.Stark. Since you are incapable of paying it at the moment, you are given a 3 month period during which you have to find a job to support yourself. At the moment, you are going to stay with Mr.Rogers."

That confused Tony and he asked: "With Steve? What about my family? I understand that all my property was taken from me after my death, but aren't they willing to at least let me live somewhere?"

The robot had an answer ready and said: "We have contacted them and they are willing to pay 60% of the bill and will set up a living space for you soon. Unfortunately, you are still unfamiliar with the time, you need someone to watch over you. Mr.Rogers volunteered."

The soldier smiled at Tony and joked: "Guess I will be the one to teach you about the future."

The genius had no more words left and so he just fell into Steve's waiting arms and hugged him.

________________________________________________

The trip to Steve's house was filled with chatter.

Tony was asking more questions about life in the future than Steve could answer, the formerly dull android eyes lit up with curiosity.

It reminded Steve of the Tony of the far past, yet he could still see the man he used to be right before his death. He missed the man, he really did. His days felt a little duller after the engineer had perished, even with so many friends stepping in and almost filling the empty space Tony had left with his death. 

Steve had moved on, but after he got his friend back, he saw that none of the people he had met after the inventor's death truly filled his shoes.

He could now give Tony the chance to live, to be happy again. 

He could teach him about the future and help him adjust.

Even if Tony moved out and left him behind, he will still cherish the time they were given to be friends once more.

_____________________________________________________

Tony felt like everything was going to be alright.   
He may not know a lot about the time he was thrown into, but he was a quick learner.

He had more hope about the future than he had had for a very long time. Sure, he was happy in his former, fleshy life, but that didn't silence his worrying brain from believing that he was going to fuck up one day and bring about everyone's doom.

As Steve was explaining the current movies, the car stopped.

They had arrived at the destination - Steve's house.

It wasn't a brand new building, but it's style was still odd and futuristic to the inventor. Its walls were light blue with slightly elevated flowers painted on with a darker blue and the door had a blue flower on it.

When they had reached the door, it opened, revealing the warm yellowish green of the house's inside.

"Make yourself at home, Tony. It's nothing all that fancy, but it should be enough for the two of us."

Tony smiled at that and assured: "Steve, you opened your home to me. It doesn't matter what it looks like."

"I'm going to make food for myself now. The items that were sent to you should be in the living room, the package bot usually drops them off there," the soldier said and gestured in the direction of the living room to not confuse the engineer.

It felt weird to leave Steve, even if it was just for a while and not even far away, just to the other room. The thoughts of his friends and family bubbled to the surface of his mind, but he pushed them down to enjoy the tiny time he had during what he could just explore the world.

True to the other man's word, a package laid on the couch, ready to be opened.

It didn't have Steve's name on it as he had expected. Instead, his own name was written on it with neat letters.

As soon as he touched it, the cover receded into a tiny ball and flew out the window, exposing the contents of the box.

In there was a physical ID, a tiny disk, the physical copy of his Certificate of Sentience and a bank card.

Tony took the disk and pressed the blue circle in the center of it. 

Immediately something resembling a phone screen was created from it, evaporating the disk, but leaving the blue circle to the bottom left corner of it.

The phone was quite big and thin, as he would expect from a phone of the future.

He had similar technology when he had died, but it was still mostly used by the rich. As he didn't believe he would be sent an expensive phone, the former futuristic technology had become cheap and accessible.

The screen lit up and adjusted into the optimal brightness in a second.

Excited, he immersed himself into the wonders of technology.

The engineer was so distracted that he didn't notice Steve entering, food in hand.

"It has only been 7 hours since we found you and you are already on your phone," he said, making Tony jump slightly. 

Steve extended one of his arms and gave a plate to Tony, saying: "Here, I made food for you too. Your model can digest food and get energy from it, even if your body mostly runs on electricity from your arc reactor," seeing Tony's confused face, he added, "I just thought it would be familiar for you to eat actual food."

The man dove in immediately, then paused for a moment and spoke: "Thanks, Steve. That's really nice of you," and then continued wolfing down the meal.

Rogers ate his food slowly, but then stopped for a moment and directed his piercing blue eyes towards the genius and asked: "What did you find from that phone of yours?"

The man swallowed his food and started to ramble: "First, there were instructions on how to use the phone, which was really easy. Then there were all sorts of things about this mechanical body im currently inhabiting, proper care, limits and all the other thingiemajingies. Hmm, what else was there," he stopped to think for a little while and then continued, "Oh, my bank account things, the bills. Then I set everything up and started looking for a job. Well, tried to. I actually don't know where to look for it."

The soldier couldn't quite keep up with the fast-speaking man, so he needed a while to understand him. When he had mentally rewound the last sentence, he smiled mischievously and said: "Well, Stark Industries is still up and running and hiring new people. You may be behind with the times, but you can always get a lower level job."

"Oh," said Tony, "I didn't think of that. It would feel weird to work in my former company and not have the responsibility of the almost everyone working in there. I could do what I love and not have to deal with everyone's problems."

Before returning to his phone again, he looked at Steve with a sincerely happy face and said: "Thank you for all you have done for me."

"I didn't do anything big, but thanks anyway. I'm happy to help you how I can."

They spent the rest of the day together, Steve helping Tony, telling him stories about his life after the other man had died, the historical things that had happened and even the trends.

The evening was filled with watching movies and video calls from Tony's family and the remaining Avengers.

____________

Three days later, Tony had a job interview. 

He was a bit nervous and kept straightening his tie, even if it was already perfect.

He didn't know how anything worked in this time, but he had done extensive research and had asked Steve's friends about it.

The fact that he could now connect to the Internet without having any outside devices in his hand was quite the surprise. He had read through the instructions of his new, robotic body, but hadn't quite grasped how he was supposed to do it, until yesterday.

For the last few days, a robot came to check on him every day, asked some questions from Steve, scanned the genius and left.

Tony had been reading everything about the future that might be of use, from the current politics to fashion.

He wouldn't lie, he was afraid. This time wasn't all that different from the 2040s, but it still felt like he was looking at a funhouse mirror.

Tony would have taken a deep breath, but his absence of lungs didn't allow that, so he just stopped what he was doing, took the few documents he had and walked out the door to the car.

He waved his goodbye to the soldier and looked away when the car started moving.

 

_______________________________

Steve was nervous.

He knew Tony would succeed, but he was still as ill-equipped as Steve had been when he first got to the 21st century.

Even if Tony's first attempt at getting a job might fail, he will still understand the world of the future better by trying.

He might not become the celebrity he used to be, but maybe, this time, he could do what he really loves, without the expectations of everyone on his shoulders, without everyone looking at him for answers.

_____________________________

Tony came back in a couple of hours.

His android body revealed no signs of being tired, but Steve could see it in his eyes.

Tony hadn't been prepared.

"How did it go?" the superhuman asked.

"It could have been better. To be honest, I don't know at all. I don't know anything. I can just hope."

Steve could see the hopelessness on the android's face now and he pulled Tony into a tight hug.

"You can always try again, you can apply again later. Nothing is set in stone," he assured, rubbing the genius's back.

"Steve, it's not just about that. I don't feel human anymore, I don't know anything about anything at all and I feel like I'm supposed to. It's been too little time to do so many things."

"Let's just get ice cream."

Tony pulled himself out of the hug with his enhanced, metal muscles and said: "I appreciate that, but I don't see how an ice cream could help here."

"You wanted more time. Maybe what you need is having your moment. For the past days, all we have been doing is talk about the future and its differences. You haven't had time to just be."

______________________________________________

They were quietly eating their ice creams, Steve eating his 3rd and Tony still licking his half-melted one.

Looking absently into the distance, Tony murmured: "Thanks."

Steve paused shoveling ice cream into his mouth and asked: "For what?"

"Everything. You were willing to take me in and help me even after all these years, fully knowing that I would one day move on and leave again. I don't know how I could repay you."

That made the soldier think for a while, another spoonful of delicious frozen treat halfway to his mouth.

Finally, he said: "I just wanted to be your friend again. I want you to be happy, to do what you love."

"I can't promise you anything, but I will try. Even if I fail, I will one day succeed again. I was given another shot at life, I will take it," he said, his big brown eyes turning warm and almost human-like, pure hope reigniting in their depths.

The android truly smiled for the first time since he awoke and whispered: "I will live. I already am.

And that's what he did. Happily.


End file.
